20

UNIX /LINUX FILE/DIRECTORY-3

PERMISSIONS
 LECTURE AGENDA
 Manipulating Files:
 grep, uniq, wc
 find, sort
 cut, paste

Permission commands
FIND COMMAND
4
 Allows you to find files and directories in a directory
hierarchy and perform subsequent operations on
them.
 Syntax: $ find [pathname] [-name filename]
Example
Search for a file by pattern
$ find /home -name "*.txt"
Search for a file by specific name
$ find /home -name file.txt
SORT COMMAND
5
 sorts lines contained in a group of files alphabetically
 Syntax: $ sort [options] [filenames]

EXAMPLE

$ sort file.txt displays records in ascending order

$ sort -n file.txt (Numeric numbers)
$ sort -r file.txt(reverse order)
$ sort –k 2 file1.txt(sorting table)
Apple orange
Grapes banana
Pears plum
Cherries lemon
 GREP COMMAND
6

 Print Lines Matching a Pattern

 $ grep[-options] pattern filenames

EXAMPLE

$ grep hello *.txt

$ grep ‘boo’ /etc/passwd
GREP COMMAND
 Perform case insensitive search for the
string boo
$ grep -i ‘boo’ /etc/passwd

 To search and display total number of

times that string appears in that file
$ grep -c ‘boo’ /etc/passwd
 DISCOVERY QUESTION
14

What does the option (-r) do in case of the grep

command?
 UNIQ COMMANDS
7
 uniq accepts a sorted list of data from either
standard input or a single filename argument
(see the uniq man page for details) and, by
default, removes any duplicates from the list.
 Example: $ uniq food.txt
apple
apple
banaba
banaba
cherry
grapes
 WC COMMAND
8

 The wc (word count) command is used to display

the number of lines, words, and bytes contained
in files. For example:

 Example: $ wc food.txt
4 8 53
food.txt
Apple orange
Grapes banana
Pears plum
Cherries lemon
 CUT COMMAND
10

 The cut command is used to extract a section of

text from a line and output the extracted section
to standard output. It can accept multiple file
arguments or input from standard input.

 Syntax : cut [options] filename

 CUT COMMAND
11

 Option Description
 -c char_list Extract the portion of the line defined by char_list.
The list may consist of one or more comma-separated
numerical ranges.
 -f field_list Extract one or more fields from the line as defined by
field_list. The list may contain one or more fields or
field ranges separated by commas.
 -d delim_char When -f is specified, use delim_char as the field
delimiting character. By default, fields must be
separated by a single tab character.
 --complement Extract the entire line of text, except for those
portions
specified by -c and/or -f.
 CUT COMMAND: EXAMPLE
12

 Example: $ cut -d' ' –f2 food.txt

orange
banana
plum
lemon
Apple orange
Grapes banana
Pears plum
Cherries lemon
 PASTE COMMAND
13

 Combines the contents of one or more files

to output to the screen or another file
 Syntax: paste [-options] source files[>destination file]

 Example: paste –d ‘,’ vegetables.txt meat.txt > food.txt

Carrots Chicken Carrots,Chicken

Spinach Turkey Spinach,Turkey
Lettuce Beans Beef Lamb Lettuce,Beef
vegetable.txt meat.txt Beans,Lamb
food.txt
 DISCOVERY QUESTION
14

What does the option (-s) do in case of the

paste command?
PERMISSIONS
21

As a multi-user system Unix/Linux relies on permissions to

make sure the right user is able to do the right things.

Permissions manage who can read, write, or execute files.

PERMISSION
22

 $ > foo.txt
 $ ls -l
foo.txt
EXPLAINED
23

 Attribute File Type

 - A regular file.

 d A directory.

 l A symbolic link. Notice that with symbolic links, the remaining file
 attributes are always rwxrwxrwx and are dummy values. The real
file attributes are those of the file the symbolic link points to.

 c A character special file. This file type refers to a device that

handles data as a stream of bytes, such as a terminal or modem.

 b A block special file. This file type refers to a device that handles
data in blocks, such as a hard drive or CD-ROM drive.
TYPES OF FILES - PERMISSION
 We can use ls –l command to know the type of the file
 Example1: ls –l /dev/ram
lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 4 Mar 22 2020 /dev/ram -> ram1
symbolic link.

 Example 2: ls –l /dev/tty
crw-rw-rw- 1 root tty 5, 0 Jan 24 11:29 /dev/tty
 b or c indicates a device file

 Example 3: ls –ld directoryname

drwx------ 3 Alice staff 4096 Jan 26 16:57 directoryname
 d indicates directory

 Example 4: ls –l filename
-rw------- 1 n01547728 staff 0 Jan 26 16:18 week3
- indicates a regular file

PERMISSIONS EXPLAINED
24

Attributes Files Directories

r (read) Allows a file to be opened and read. Allows a directory’s contents to

be listed if the execute attribute
is also set.
w (write) Allows a file to be written to or truncated; Allows files within a directory to
however, this attribute does not allow files to be be created, deleted, and
renamed or deleted. renamed if the execute attribute
The ability to delete or rename files is determined is also set.
by directory attributes.

x (execute) Allows a file to be treated as a program and Allows a directory to be entered;

executed. Program files written in scripting e.g.,
languages must also be set as readable to be cd directory.
executed.
 CHMOD
COMMAND
23

 This command is used to change the mode

(permissions) of a file or directory.

$ chmod [options] filename(s)

CHMOD COMMAND
24

 Only the file’s owner or the superuser can change

the mode of a file or directory.
 chmod supports two distinct ways of specifying
mode changes:
 octal
number representation
 symbolic representation.

…
CHMOD COMMAND
(CONT’D)
25

 Permission Mapping
Octal Binary File Mode
0 000 ---
1 001 --x
2 010 -w-
3 011 -wx
4 100 r--
5 101 r-x
6 110 rw-
7 111 rwx
CHMOD COMMAND
(CONT’D)
26

 Octal representation: permissions may be

specified as a sequence of 3 octal digits
 Example:

$ chmod 600 private.txt

$ chmod 711 data

CHMOD COMMAND (CONT’D)
27
 Symbolic representation: Permissions may be specified
symbolically

 Using symbols: u (user), g (group), o (other), a (all), r

(read), w (write), x (execute), + (add permission),
- (take away permission) and = (assign permission).

 Example:

$ chmod u=rw,go-rw private.txt

$ chmod g-w,o+x prog1
CHMOD COMMAND
(CONT’D)
28

 The chmod command can be used with the

–R option:

$ chmod -R go+r Playground

 READING ASSIGNMENTS
37

 Sobell, Mark G. A Practical Guide to Ubuntu

Linux. (Humber library eBook):
 Chapter 5, Basic Utilities:
 Pages 160-170.

 Chapter 6, The Linux File System:

 Pages 215-220.
REFERENCES
38

 Palmer, Michael, Jack Dent, and Tony Gaddis.

Guide to UNIX using Linux. 3rd ed. Boston, Mass:
Thomson/Course Technology, 2005.
 Petersen, Richard. Linux, Programmer's Reference.
2nd ed. Berkeley, Calif: Osborne McGraw-Hill,
2000.
 Sobell, Mark G. A Practical Guide to Ubuntu Linux.
Fourthition. ed. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice
Hall, 2015.